DROP RULE (Transact-SQL)

DROP RULE will be removed in a future version of Microsoft SQL Server. Avoid using DROP RULE in new development work, and plan to modify applications that currently use them. Instead, use CHECK constraints that you can create by using the CHECK keyword of CREATE TABLE or ALTER TABLE. For more information, see CHECK Constraints

To drop a rule, first unbind it if the rule is currently bound to a column or to an alias data type. To unbind the rule, use sp_unbindrule. If the rule is bound when you try to drop it, an error message is displayed and the DROP RULE statement is canceled.

After a rule is dropped, new data entered into the columns previously governed by the rule is entered without the constraints of the rule. Existing data is not affected in any way.

The DROP RULE statement does not apply to CHECK constraints. For more information about dropping CHECK constraints, see ALTER TABLE (Transact-SQL).